


The Perks of Being a Lunatic

by HenryMercury



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Domesticity, F/F, Ministry Events, Multi, Polyamory, Rarepair Bingo
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-14
Updated: 2018-05-14
Packaged: 2019-05-06 19:35:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,841
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14654706
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HenryMercury/pseuds/HenryMercury
Summary: Pansy is often asked if it's hard, being in a relationship with three other women. The answer is yes, obviously; three's a crowd and four's lunacy at the best of times.





	The Perks of Being a Lunatic

**Author's Note:**

> For rarepair bingo: movie night, kneesocks, strap-ons.

Pansy is often asked if it's hard, being in a relationship with three other women. The answer is yes, obviously; three's a crowd and four's lunacy at the best of times. Pansy would not describe her relationship as an easy one if for no other reason than the sheer amount of hair she finds in all locations at all times.

There are Hermione's wiry curls, as stubborn as the rest of her and liable to clog every drain in the place. Then there are Parvati's thick, straight strands which Pansy finds clinging to every piece of clothing she owns even when it's just been cleaned. And finally, Lavender's long wavy hairs are a menace, nearly invisible but very much able to be felt. Pansy pulled one out of her _mouth_ three hours into her work day last Thurs. Pansy, the most civilised of them all, keeps her bob short and brushes it well each morning and evening to weed out the weak links.

It is nice, though, sitting around on movie nights, all four of them in their pyjamas, Pansy half-ignoring the film in favour of watching Parvati's sure fingers parting and braiding Hermione's hair. And it's nice the way Lavender's blonde waves flow almost like a blanket over Pansy's front when Lav gets tired and rests her head in Pansy's lap.

It's nice having breakfast on Saturdays, when they're all actually home for a brief window around eight—Pansy's home from her standing Slytherin night-on-the-town, and Hermione's not yet left for the general healing surgery (which she does on all weekdays at a quarter past six, the madwoman). Even if breakfast usually consists of leftover curry from Parvati's Friday family dinners and some of Hermione's gritty filter coffee, it feels fantastically luxurious to have a moment alone with them all, away from the demands of the outside world.

It's nice always having a date available for events, too—although Parvati and Lavender always do better with coordinating loud, colourful outfits according to the fashion of the moment, and Pansy and Hermione usually opt for classic, practical blacks and whites.

It's how they met, in fact: yet another post-war commemorative function, yet another black tie event where those who managed to invest just slightly more in the side of the victors got to jerk each other off in celebration of their superior moral consciences, or whatever. At the time, Pansy had been doing her community service at a shelter for Muggleborns left homeless after the war. The shelter had been established by none other than Hermione Granger, who spent at least a full day volunteering there each week even though she was also a Healer in training.

She'd been there the day of the Gala, providing pepper-up and pain relief potions to those who'd been affected by a minor but unpleasant round of flu going through the shelter. The way she kept track of everyone staying there, knew by name anyone she'd spoken to even once, had made Pansy's belief that she was only doing it to look good and selfless impossible to sustain.

"...yet another Ministry thing tonight," Hermione had complained as she and Pansy both found themselves brewing cheap teabags in the shelter's kitchen mid-afternoon. "Ron's sick, and we were supposed to go together. Zach Smith keeps asking me and I only got him to shut up because I told him I'd committed irrevocably to another date."

"Tell him to fuck off louder, then," Pansy had suggested. "Tell him you've got a boyfriend, and even if you didn't he'd be the last guy on earth you'd take as a date."

Hermione had smiled at that, and Pansy realised abruptly that she hadn't been smiled at by Hermione before simply for saying something. She'd been smiled at for fulfilling tasks, for taking care of new arrivals at the shelter, or for chatting with the residents. But never just for _being her_. It was, to Pansy's dismay, an utterly disarming experience.

"Well, I don't have a boyfriend," Hermione explained. "So that wouldn't exactly stand up. But the second part is pretty accurate. Honestly, I could just keep saying no to him, but it's tiring. We're in Healer training together, and I'm sick of having to hear him nattering while I'm trying to learn."

"You and Weasley _aren't_ together?"

"Not anymore." Hermione lifted her teabag out of her mug, vanished the little staple in it and then put the rest in the compost bin they kept for use in the garden out the back of the shelter building. "We're still each other's standing dates for these things, though. Much easier."

Pansy had laughed softly as she did the same thing with her teabag. "You know, I used to be jealous of how much attention you all got. But these days I'm actually grateful nobody invites me to those circle-jerks."

Hermione had laughed openly at that, and it felt like the best thing Pansy had achieved in ages.

"You know, Parkinson, despite almost everything I used to think about you... you're alright."

Pansy smirked and sipped her tea. "High praise," she said, but could still feel herself flushing a little.

"Come to the Gala with me tonight."

" _What?_ "

"You heard me. Come to the Gala."

"Wh- _why?_ "

"Because I'd rather be able to concentrate on how pain relief potions interact with the magical nervous system in class tomorrow than have to hear Smith going on about how I'm a liar, and I'm just playing hard to get but there's no need... and also because I'd rather not go alone when I could have someone there with me who actually knows what I do, and understands what it's like to be on the ground helping people. To roll eyes with when all those old men act like donating a hundred of their million galleons is virtually the same thing as running a shelter."

That much of Hermione's attention on her had scrambled Pansy's brain, and all that had come out of her mouth in response was: "I have nothing to wear."

"We've got three hours," Hermione had said, one of her plan-making smiles dawning on her face, lighting her eyes. "We'll find a way."

Pansy had never expected to actually find herself out the back of the gala snogging Hermione, but then she'd never expected to find herself there in the first place. She'd long since accepted that for most of her life she'd understood the world all wrong, and had stopped being quite so shocked when things didn't turn out the way she expected.

When they heard voices approaching, they'd ducked in behind the side wall and found themselves face to face with Lavender Brown and Parvati Patil, whose respective lipsticks were no longer confined to their lips. Together, they'd listened to a couple of old Ministry officials posturing about their personal _invaluable_ contributions to Voldemort's demise.

At some point, Parvati had fished a bedazzled flask of vodka out of Lavender's cleavage (forcing Pansy to admit that the extensive ruffling on her dress was not as impractical as it seemed) and whispered, "Drink every time he says, " _working from the inside_."

They'd all been quite drunk by the time they made it back into the ballroom and parted ways.

It'd been such a bizarrely thrilling night, Pansy had reflected once back in her own little flat, it was rather a shame it would never happen again.

Except it had; Hermione had forwarded her a plus-one invitation to the next stupid Gala, and once inside they'd found Lavender and Parvati, and by the end of it none of them could quite deny that they were friends.

It's definitely one of the weirder things that's ever happened to Pansy, and she reflects on this daily when she wakes up in their giant bed with Parvati's hair in her mouth, Hermione's already quietly dressing herself for work, Lavender snoring. She remembers a time when she believed not even one person would ever want to love her again.

They haven't _said_ they love each other, per se, but it's there. It's there in the way Lavender knits terrible holey socks for them all, which go all the way up to their knees, and the way she goes on a whole baking tear when any of them have a birthday. It's there in the way that they all wear the terrible knee socks, and eat more cupcakes than they should. It's there, Pansy thinks, in the way that she cleans the bathroom despite the fact it's not _her_ clogging up the drain in the shower, or collecting face masks until there's no room for anything else on the counter. It's there in the way Hermione takes days off work for them, even though work is her life, and the way Parvati's issued them all with a standing invitation to the Patil Friday dinners for whenever they're not busy.

It's there in the bedroom too, of course, but Pansy fucked enough people who didn't even like her before Hermione asked her out that she knows sex alone isn't the key indicator. What matters most is the way they talk about what they want and don't want. The way it's okay for Parvati to want to sit out the heavier physical intimacy most of the time and just watch or make suggestions, or for Pansy to duck out of the room when she starts feeling too much, too intensely and has to calm herself down.

Lavender's always ordering new toys off the internet, all seemingly random items but united by a theme of pink and glitter. She's got three different pink strap-ons, fluffy pastel handcuffs, peach-flavoured lubricant in nigh-industrial quantities and so many sequinned nipple pasties and tassels that sometimes Pansy wants to stick them all over herself all at once just to see what the fuck that looks like. Pansy likes that Lavender feels comfortable to present them with whatever takes her fancy that week without fear of judgment—not even from Hermione, whom Lavender and Parvati have finally convinced that high femininity itself is not the enemy where it's actually enjoyed by the person performing it.

Hermione does much the same thing, except for her the theme is usually _experimental_. She's a fucking genius in bed right up to the point at which she becomes a scientist, and it's never really stopped surprising Pansy that while it definitely makes her feel good to get off with Hermione and her sexual gadgetry, she feels just as cared for when she can look at the shiny sounding kit Hermione's brought home (she had to do a course before the sex shop had let her buy it) and say _no way_ , knowing that it won't ruin everything. The ability to give her answer in situations like this without it being judged as the wrong answer is something she's continually learning that she has now.

Pansy is often asked if it's hard, being in a relationship with three other women. The answer is yes, obviously—but it's worth every bit of trouble.


End file.
